Is the cost to save Yara too high?

Stardate 1.31.15
After arriving upon Dathomir the Crew of The Blackhawk immediately coordinate the decontamination of the vessel while Koyi and Caster Troy find a camp ground to set up in. This process take the better part of the day and after it is finished the team breaks into groups to investigate the dig site and find Yara.

Not interested in finding another woman and well knowing the kind of life that dwells on Dathomir, Koyi wisely decides to “sit this one out”. Dr. Doom’s metallic eyes narrow at the mention that Koyi will stay aboard and it immediately volunteers to watch her…the ship, to watch the ship. Trey Nord stays to continue his upkeep of the containment field for the human body found on the derelict, as does Dr. Durani’. Johnny Ricards stays aboard to work on repairs and tune up the speeder bike which Haal will use to scout ahead during their search for Yara.

Vitaly, Haal, Reedro, Caster Troy, and Sueh make their way through the torrential downpour and thick rocky Dathomir forests to the dig site 5 miles away. During their journey they are stung, bit, swarmed, and stalked by all manner of poisonous, monstrous, and generally off putting creatures. During the Downpour they find a small tent surrounded by a minor electric fence. Inside is Lucas Mandel of Hamlyn Wood Co. He has been bitten by a snake. Feverish and delirious, he begs the group for their help in finding his children. Caster Troy pulls Lucas’ boot off to find his leg horribly swollen while Reedro asks him what its worth to find them since he’s pretty much “On his way out”.

Sueh hears a roar just above the thunder in the background and scales a try to find what she finds out is a Rancor mother and two pups scavenging not 300 meters away from their position. This prompts them to throw Lucas on the back of the speeder bike with Haal who finds that speeding off through the Dathomir jungle is much harder then he anticipated, let alone carrying an unconscious burly man. Regardless he arrives in time for Dr. Durani’ to begin surgery. In the mean time the rest of the group hangs tight awaiting Haal’s return.

While waiting for Haal the team observes the Rancor as she pulls down trees and devours the fleeing inhabitants. As they are doing this a reptilian creature begins to bark at Vitaly. Seuh sees the mother turn its head to the noise and then melt beneath thicker canopy. The hunt begins. There is lots of stalking, chasing, running, hiding, and a data pad is even destroyed. Ultimately the party reunites and flees the area breaking over an elevation point and seeing their destination 2 miles away.

The party continues trudging on to find a clearing of cut down trees. Stationed there is a YZ-775 and contingent of Raptors. Degatu of the Rivar clan is personally there. The Black Hawk crew meets the war worn Rodian surrounded by his military and find that Degatu is in possession of Yara. Vitaly and Haal find that Yara was “rescued” by the Raptors just outside of an asteroid field. She offered to buy her freedom through finding a holocron and a buyer. This led them to Dathomir but upon attempting to retrieve the holocron is was said that Yara led the Rodians into a trap in an attempt to escape their clutches. She failed to avoid capture and was punished harshly for her deceit.

Using this information Captain Haal and Vitaly began a subtle negotiation for Yara’s freedom. As an offer of good will Captain Haal offers medical attention to 2 of Degatu’s critically injured men. While Haal talked business with Degatu and drank fine whisky, Vitaly was taken to see the woman who he thought had been lost. Besides the brutality that has been visited upon her she remains as beautiful as she was the last time he saw her.

Stardate 2.1.15
Dr. Durani’ performs surgery on the critically wounded Rodians and immediately flat lines the most severely wounded of the two. Dr. Doom steps in. Perhaps another day Dr. Durani’ would object but Dr. Doom’s demeanor that particularly day was quite intimidating.

In a clever and lengthy investigation and negotiation Vitaly and Haal are able to indeed purchase Yara’s freedom with an active red lightsaber. Vitaly worries about leaving the lightsaber and possibly the Holocron in the hands of a bunch of ex-black ops Rodian slavers, but the feel of Yara’s hands on his back quells most of his doubts. The team begins to leave Dathomir, but when Lucas’ pleas for their help one last time, Yara, in a medical bed nearby hears him and explains that is much more likely the children were taken by the Witches of Dathomir than eaten by Rancors and she helps convince the team to make one quick look to see if they can’t find his lost children at a nearby settlement.

Stardate 01.29.15
Never one to refuse help to a fellow duros, Cpt. Haal Ricards dangerously dropped his ship out of hyperspace when his sensitive scanners caught a fragment of a distress call deep from within the dark spaces between the stars.

But they were all dead. The human, the selonian, and the duros, their bodies laid our for hull rats and their addled droid mindlessly blaring their last words to the universe. A packet of dark purple vegetable matter, strangely beautiful when it blooms, had bored through the ship’s carapace and eaten away its systems from the inside. The vines destroyed the ship, but what killed the people?

The Blackhawk scout team salvaged what they could and returned to their vessels quickly, since new information of the alien plants germination added haste to their movements. Asteroids carrying dormant seeds were in danger of crashing into the Blackhawk and the stealth ship. Later, on Dathomir, the crew would be forced to tear apart their vessels and chemical remove all strains of the alien flora.

Only one specimen of this alien matter exists on the Blackhawk, packed away in a small sample tube under the care of Dr. Durani’.

After Dropping Cad Bane off at Bargos the Hutt’s Villa the crew of the Blackhawk break into teams to accomplish many tasks.

Just outside of Bargo’s villa Vitaly and Caster Troy both disembark in the midst of a lightning-filled sand storm. From there they run to Old Blue Eyes to check on the state of affairs surrounding the villa. They find the people of the small town to be scarce and fearful. More then usual that is. Blue Eyes itself is filled with bounty hunters. Meeting with his contact Rourk, Vitaly gets information about the happenings. Boba Fett is inbound with a team of killers to overrun Bargo’s weakened defenses. He finds that two jedi were fighting one another on the causeways of Center itself. He finds out about a traveling merchant named Dorn on "Rondo’s Beat". And lastly he invests in some information about Barab 1.

Traveling to their save spot the crew of the Blackhawk find that the skies are heavily monitored and the Imperial presence upon Lannik is in full display. They fly under the radar and avoid detection.

After receiving transportation from the old Selonian Brickard, Haal, Koyi, and Durani’ travel to Center to drop off Chrishum’s medical supplies. They travel through four Imperial check points, one of which is run by Imperial Commander Varris. They take Koyi away to station 5701-9I for interrogation. Haal and Durani’ try to intercede but the menacing Clone Troopers stop their efforts. They continue on and drop off the supplies with Chrishum.

They find that Chrishum and his family have suffered at the hands of the Imperials. Chrishum’s arm and several ribs are broken and he has been permanently blinded in his right eye. His son also has a broken arm. Nonetheless the Ithorian makes good on his deal with Haal and he is relieved to see the product has been delivered safely. The neural stabilizer is currently in route, but due to the Imperial blockade it will take some time to arrive. If the crew of the Blackhawk wishes to retrieve it themselves, it is currently waiting on Rodia.

Koyi discovers that the Imperial agents are actually rebels who have been operating in this capacity for nearly a year now. After establishing that the crew of the Blackhawk is on the level, the quite charming Commander Donovan Varris reaches out to Koyi to set up a meet between Captain Haal and himself.

Dr. Durani’, having already established contact with a Professor Liebermann prior to landing, meets him at the Center University for Science and Research. The two speak about similar interests, such as chaos theory and bio research, before Professor Liebermann slides Durani’ a picture of the missing Dr. Windum Voo’s research. He is fearful for his life and suspects he is being watched. After they continue their conversion, the faculty of the university are able to point Dr. Durani in the direction of a medical specialist who deals in organs grown for children to combat chemical imbalances.

Slipping off the ship, Reedro Ricards makes a clandestine meeting with a woman simply called Mother. She gives him a brief case and speaks to him about an unassuming mission to Coruscant. She also points him in the direction to deal with his headaches. Reedro leaves with the leather briefcase.

The group meets Trey Nord and Sueh Strom. (As I was handling about 6 things at that point I would love one of you to give a recap of that situation)

Everyone regroups at the Blackhawk. Dr. D.O.O.M. imagines his top 5 ways he would kill each of the new recruits. A diagnostic is run on the rather stripped down MX-70 by Reedro. Everything checks out.

While most of the group goes out to “Rondo’s Beat” to follow up on Smee the Dugg, Reedro, Durani’ and Trey Nord hack into the Imperial surveillance system to find out more information about the jedi sighting. What they find is disturbing. A Jedi gives chase to a cloaked man and Sess, the rather forgettable archeologist from the Malcadian group that they were with not 12 days ago. The cloaked man is able to fend off the Trandoshan Jedi just long enough for Clone Troopers to arrive. This provides a brief respite, enough for him to leap onto a shuttle with Sess and flee his pursuer. The Trandoshan Jedi, now surrounded by Clone Troopers, enters into a whirling melee killing over thirty clone troopers before disappearing into the smoke and debris caused by the destruction both parties wrought upon the docks.

At Killjoy: Vitaly introduces Haal to a Feeorin named Dorn. After some time Haal, Sueh Strom, and Trey Nord follow Dorn to the hanger where he has set up shop. Haal plays it cool when Dorn turns on him with a weapon. His assured demeanor pays off and amuses Dorn. They continue into the hanger where Haal and Sueh load up their goods. Haal pays with unmarked credits which Dorn appreciates. Putting himself in the shoes of a Duros, Dorn goes into a small room and comes out with a black box. Inside this satin lined box is a black bottle with a red wax seal. It is a 2L bottle of Sullustan Brandy, 30 year. This may or may not have been conveyed to the rest of the crew.

Meanwhile, Koyi looks for evidence of rebel activity in the Killjoy. The closest thing she can find are two shady characters standing by a wall. After asserting her womanly dominance over the uncaring Sueh Strom, she sits at the bar and starts to drink. Her first drink hits her exceptionally hard and the rest is kind of a blur.

At the same time, Castor Troy sits at the table with Smee, the Dug. Vitaly joins him after they play a few rounds of sabacc. Vitaly almost works an arrangement out, but then Castor Troy goes to removes his credits form the table. He is stopped by Smee. Castor Troy pulls a gun and after a tense standoff during which several heavily armed men who clearly have Smee’s best interests in mind stand up menacingly, Smee flips the table and begins to strangle Troy. As blaster fire commences Koyi is already up and out the door before anyone, even Caster Troy, can react. Vitaly shorts out the lights and cold cocks one of the thugs backing up Smee. In a ball of strangled blaster fire Caster Troy falls out the front door while point-blank stunning the dug who is still busy strangling him. Koyi runs from the back entrace to the front and puts down covering fire, but she is badly shot in return. The second blaster bolt meant for her finds Vitaly’s shoulder instead.

Manuel Tram, a downtrodden Utai who just recently recovered his stolen speeder bike and spent his last remaining credits on its repairs, looks up to find Vitaly’s fist meet his face. He is launched off his speeder and eats dust and grit as it peels out in his face. “My speeeeeeeder!” Koyi jumps on and they speed away taking oppressive blaster fire.

Following suit Caster Troy throws the body of the dug in a speeder and hops in himself. He takes a shot in his back that makes his extremities tingle. He then takes a shot in his neck which is excruciatingly painful only to have his breath taken from him as a bolt strikes him in the back. Heading in the direction of the Blackhawk, he passes out at the wheel in sight of Dr. Durani’, who runs to his rescue. Durani’ is quickly followed by Reedro while Haal fires up the engines and Johnny quickly tries to install the new sensors on the ship.

With time in short demand Trey Nord runs a sensor ping to try to trick the system of any functionality and power before it died again. He detected a speeder bike approaching the ship from behind. That was all Haal needed to hear before he kicked the engines into full throttle and began to take off. The Trandoshan that had chased Sess leapt from his speeder bike and used the Force to pull the ship back to him.

Dr. D.O.O.M.‘s constant plotting resulted in the droid hooking Reedro with a retraction cable before the latter left the ship. Reedro was into the ship immediately. Sueh Strom then tore Castor Troy from Durani’s care and threw him up into the swooping ship’s boarding ramp like a crumpled up dish rag.

Turning on the high powered search lights Reedro focused them on the Jedi holding the ship, which gave the Blackhawk the brief respite it needed to tear away from his telekinetic grasp. In the end the Haal was able to perform a double barn swallow scooping up Sueh Strom and the distant Vitaly and Koyii leaving the Jedi in a wake of dust. Vitaly pulled the stolen speeder into a desperate bootlegger turn without decelerating and rammed the bike up into the gullet of the cargo bay. The speeder smoothly stopped with only minor cosmetic damage to the Nameless Incom A-24 Sleuth Class Stealth Ship already held in the bay, although the dent was caused by Dr. D.O.O.M.’s head. The droid happened to be standing in the exact spot that Vitaly wanted (needed?) to park in at the same time Vitaly was parking the speeder. D.O.OM. remembers.

As a night cap to an already eventful day, Vitaly arrived at Bargos’ villa to deliver Smee and collect the promised reward. There he saw Cad Bane and Boba Fett squaring off. Boba Fett was vastly outnumbered by the many bounty hunters and mercenaries Vitaly had seen earlier in the day. Though in the end though it was between Bane and Fett. They both drew but Bane was quicker. Boba was shot three times, arm, chest, and head. However, Bane and everyone else soon found that it was in fact not Boba at all, but a droid in disguise. Perhaps Boba had never set foot on Lannik.

Vitaly stripped the droid corpse of its “fake armor” and delivered its head to Bargos for a few extra credits, which along with the shipment of Smee, released the Blackhawk crew from their obligations to him. For now……

Although Bargos, in good Hutt fashion, did try to undercut the original price. In the end, the Hutt decided that the horrific torture he would inflict upon the Dug was worth all the credits.

Hours later a sweeping Holo News Report released the shocking murders of all Hutt crime lords on Tatooine, which brings the Hutt death toll up to 9. The Jackal is claiming responsibility for these recent deaths, all 6 of which have been scorched beyond recognition.

Cad Bane takes discreet transport to Lannik

Cad Bane purchases discreet passage aboard the Blackhawk to Lannik where he discloses that he is working for the Hutts to put an end to the threats on their lives. The journey back to Lannik is quick and rough: a hyperspace skip-jump through an asteroid minefield and then directly into low orbit followed by a quick descent to the surface. It takes its toll on both the ship and its crew but the arrival goes unnoticed.
The Black Hawk will need a new comms system, we are re welding the resistors and power couplings, and the shields are being slowly regenerated through our backup generator.
Jonny Ricards sustained a mean head injury during our navigation through the asteroids but he is recovering well thanks to the assistance of Dr Durani and Ms Koyi.
Dr. D.O.O.M. almost fried his cerebral circuitry during power fluctuations but Reedro has saved him from irreparable memory damage.
Incidentally, the Imperial tracer did not survive the trip.

At least 15 gone missing; others "... afraid for their lives"

Holonet News

Yesterday, after weeks of silence, the Obroan Institute made it’s first public statement regarding the fate of several leading archaeologists stationed in the Outer Rim Territories. A popular and promising young scientist, Yara —

=== Alert ===

The ISB has declared the preceding transmission a threat to the health and well being of the Empire and its citizens and an act of especially despicable moral terrorism. The perpetrators of such arrogant and gangster-like arbitrary practices should bear in mind that its failed political affairs will face inescapable deadly blows.

Do not attempt to shut off your Holonet receiver and please remain calm.

Best show in the Universe: Reedro, Johnny, and Castor Troy all attend the Best show in the Universe. Reedro collects 6 limited edition Co D statues. 1 of which is authenticated with autograph. They attend an after party where Johnny is forced to carry Reedro back home.

The Trail: Vitaly and Ko-Yi follow up on the Dugg, Smee. Known to live on the other side of the planet in “Rondo” territory. This information is not good enough for Bargos the Hutt however and he wants more.

They all meet back at the Blackhawk and pool their information. Castor Troy was followed back to the ship. Rondo’s Kubaz network seemed to be interested in Castor, Johnny, and Reedro. Reom is the son of Carum Thrildun, one of the men responsible for the death of Ko-Yi’s father. Bargos requires a more active role from the group in regards to the “Assassination” attempt against him, though he is willing to give them more time to do so.

Vitaly meets a Celonian named Brickard who tells them about “The Heap”, a massive junk yard south east of the center of Bargos’ villa, while Castor Troy shoots jugs of water. Ko-Yi is not impressed…

Meanwhile Haal and Reedro surf the waves to find out information. It turns out that a warrant has surfaced for Haal Ricards and there was a confirmed Jedi sighting the night of the Greatest Show in the Universe. Imperial presence has been requested and the planet is in the process of being blockaded.

Vitaly, Ko-Yi, and Castor go to The Heap and find the components needed to fix Pratt’s Classic Pod Racer. Afterwards, the crew meets up and drops off an item belonging to Brickard’s nephew and meet up with Pratt to install the parts. The deal is done With Pratt’s Body Shop and the group leaves for Ryloth to pick up medical supplies from Chrishum’s.

Castor Troy and Reedro Ricards both hold in their hot little hands an address.